Shiragiku
by Blue Mage Quartet
Summary: Asuma always brought her flowers.


**Shiragiku**

* * *

Asuma always brought her flowers.

The first bouquet had been positively alive with colors as diverse as the ones that danced across the air after a fresh spring rain- star shaped scarlet pimpernels, irises that recalled a summer sky, and the clustered starburst petals of the lantana.

Kurenai happily accepted his gift, even though she knew a rough and tumble character such as the bearded jounin didn't have much of an eye for _ikebana _and had in all likelihood bribed Ino to "arrange something that looks pretty."

There were other times where he had unceremoniously thrust in her direction a clump of reeds and grass with mud still clinging to the roots after being uprooted from a ditch—and Kurenai had still lovingly accepted the gift and found a nice little vase to place them in, under a patch of sunlight in the corner of her apartment. She had even watered them occasionally.

Because it was the thoughts that mattered, right?

The last flower he had brought her had been neither extravagant nor unpleasant.

His hands, large, heavy, the knuckles grooved and smelling of iron from where he kept the trench knives, had caressed her face with a gentleness that belied his gruff exterior. Yet his touch was not unfamiliar to her.

After exploring every groove and dip in her willowy features, his hands gravitated towards her right ear. Pushing a stray raven lock back to the nape of her neck, Asuma perched the stem of a bright magenta colored flower behind her ear.

The petals closed themselves like a jaw snapping shut as Asuma leaned in to kiss her. And though she never directly told him so, Kurenai loved the way his stubble felt against the smoothness of her own skin when their lips connected, the coarse scratchiness and roughness of his outward appearance directly contrasting with how tender and loving he was with her.

After what seemed like hours but what Kurenai knew was only minutes, Asuma drew back, and with a smile, said, "It brings out your eyes." He turned to leave, and Kurenai could not have known it was the last time they would touch.

* * *

The withered snapdragon fell to the dry, cracked earth unnoticed. Kurenai sat unmoving, hands folded gracefully on the lap of her black mourning kimono.

The script on the gravestone bored itself into her mind, but she did not know if she could ever understand what it said.

Her slim hands flitted close to her midsection, fingertips morosely brushing her stomach in time to the small heartbeat she could feel.

"This child…" Kurenai murmured in a voice just barely above a whisper, other hand reaching tremulously towards the gravestone. She traced the characters of his name, her fingers lingering on each word for several seconds as if she was hoping to absorb them and keep them inside her forever.

"Asuma, it's the only thing I have left of you." The glistening tears fell uninhibited from her, splashing to the earth in moist, intricate patterns.

Her mind began to wander as the overcast, grey clouds dimmed the sun and the cold breeze rattled through her bones.

They had promised their child would be raised without war.

A place where young men and women, barely out of childhood themselves, wouldn't be raised as tools that carry out the beck and call of their power hungry nations.

Their child would live in a place where betrayal, tragedy, and death wouldn't be an everyday possibility.

"We..." Kurenai choked, wiping the tears from her face, "we were going to have a flower garden. We would've had everything; Lotus, peach blossoms, magnolia, azaleas, and the flowers would never suffer through drought. They would always be healthy, vibrant, and beautiful… the ground would never be razed in the chaos of war."

"But promises are meant to be broken, aren't they, Asuma?" Kurenai said, her body shuddering while a shaky smile appeared on her face. Gingerly, she produced from beneath the folds of her kimono a white chrysanthemum.

"This…" she stood up, her voice a breathy whisper, "this is one promise I will keep for you."

The white, shaggy headed flower next to the browned, withered bright red of the snapdragon would be the only signs she had been there.

Kurenai would always bring him flowers.

* * *

** I think I utterly failed at trying to be profound. Constructive criticism/general advice please?**

**Also, for any curious, Shiragiku is the Japanese word for white chrysanthemum. White chrysanthemum are flowers used commonly in Japanese funeral flower arrangements. **


End file.
